Fun with Pholiota aurivella

These are a fairly prominent mushroom group in the local coniferous forests around Vancouver, BC. I used the local Golden Pholiota (Pholiota aurivella group) which I harvested and dried during last fall. Pholiota can be differentiated by similar mushrooms in the field by their (usually) slimy caps, veil, frequently slender overall build and mostly clustered growth habit (Mushrooms Demystified, p. 385).

TLDR: 44 grams of dried mushroom to 22 grams of wool (two skeins, one mordanted with alum and the other with iron). Dyestuff simmered for an hour, then fiber simmered for another hour and rinsed. Alum skein: pale honey yellow colour, iron skein: deep tan.

Harvested and dried

The Pholiota was harvested in several spots last fall. These were then chopped up and dried in a dehydrator for about 10 hours and then stored in glass jars.

I used two skeins weighing 11 grams each. One premordanted with alum (16% Weight of Fiber) and the other with iron (6% WOF). I decided on a 2:1 mushroom to fiber ratio and measured out 44 grams of dried mushrooms (a bit more mushrooms than is pictured).

Into the pot

The mushroom pieces were then added into a pot of warm tap water. I tend to chop up the pieces a little more mostly to give myself something to do as the pot is heating up. The dye pot was heated to a simmer for about an hour (and occasionally poked at as is tradition). The pot was then left to cool.

Once again, the two wool skeins were soaked in room temperature tape water for about an hour and then placed into a mesh paint bag which allows the fiber to move freely but keeps the fungi from adhering to the fiber. The mesh bag was then added to the dyepot.

Simmered for 1 hour

The dye pot started off with quite a bitter mushroom smell but it mellowed into that familiar earthy mushroomy smell.

If you want a pale yellow or deep tan, Pholiotas are your mushrooms

Inner skein: alum premordant, Outer skein: iron premordant